Swiss-born Michel Corboz was a conductor whose joy in singing inspired his exploration of choral works and opera. A fine baritone with a background in church music, he strove for an orchestra that sings. In addition to the ancient repertoire which brought him fame, he devoted the same energy and profound continuity to the periods that followed: Austro-Germans Mozart, Haydn, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms and Beethoven; Italians Verdi, Puccini and Rossini; Swiss and Frenchmen Martin, Honegger, Saint-Saëns and Fauré – whose Requiem Corboz recorded in 1972, marking a true milestone in recorded music history! Beyond his vast flexibility of style, Corboz, the sculptor of voices, sought to draw the listener into an encompassing experience of expressiveness and joy.

Michel Corboz, The Complete Erato Recordings: Classical & Romantic Eras (36 CDs) draws together all the recordings of Classical, Romantic and post-Romantic music that Michel Corboz (1934-2021) conducted for Erato over a period of almost 40 years (1968-1997).

The vast majority of the recordings are sacred and vocal music, whether unaccompanied (a cappella) or accompanied by an instrumental ensemble/orchestra.

This is the second and smaller of two boxes to be devoted to Corboz’s Erato discography; the first, released in October 2022, comprises music from Rennaissance and Baroque Eras.

Michel Corboz was born in 1934 in the canton of Fribourg in French-speaking Switzerland.

After he died on 1 September 2021, the City of Lausanne hailed him as an “emblematic figure of the vocal art”.  In an interview published in 2021, Corboz said: “It is not enough that there is a voice. There has to be imagination, musical movement, a sense of rhythm, a desire to communicate with your voice.”

Corboz gained his formative musical experiences in the Catholic church, above all through choral singing. Himself a fine baritone, he studied singing and composition in Fribourg. On a conducting course in Siena he discovered the music of Monteverdi, comparatively little-known at the time.

Corboz formed his own vocal group in 1955 and in 1961 launched the Ensemble Vocal de Lausanne, a flexible ensemble of 12-20 singers. The ensemble was admired for its precision, balance, homogeneity and flexibility.

In 1964 the Ensemble Vocal de Lausanne participated in a festival in Nevers in France, attracting the attention of the Erato label’s artistic director/chief producer, Michel Garcin. The first Corboz/EVL recording for Erato was of a mass by Monteverdi and music by Monteverdi’s teacher Ingegneri. Corboz went on to record regularly and prolifically for Erato until 1990.

In 1969 Corboz became principal conductor of the Gulbenkian Choir (known in French as the Chœur Symphonique et Orchestre de la Fondation Gulbenkian) in Lisbon, which, like the Ensemble Vocal de Lausanne, features prominently in his Erato discography.

Corboz also conducted the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra (Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne) and ensembles such as the Chamber Orchestra of the Suisse-Romande, the Danish Radio Orchestra, the Bavarian Radio Choir, Sinfonia Varsovia and the Choir and Orchestra of the Theatro Colón in Buenos Aires. He taught choral conducting at the Geneva Conservatory for nearly three decades.

The first recording in which Michel Corboz conducted a work distinct from the early repertoire for which he is famous, Fauré's Requiem of 1972 remains a milestone, a real miracle. Beyond the fields of the Baroque, his discography will extend to the Austro-German side of course, without abandoning the exploration of the margins; more unexpectedly, to the Italians of the 19th century; but also by honouring the French and Swiss composers who followed the Romantic periode.

Corboz’s priority was to do justice to the composer with vivid interpretations, and he was happy to collaborate with the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, the Gulbenkian Orchestra of Lisbon, and with keyboard solosits Christiane Jaccottet, Luciano Sgrizzi and Marie-Claire Alain.

Three-and-a-half of this 36-disc set are receiving their first CD release and have been specially remastered in high definition.